Ralph Breaks the Internet<\/i><\/strong> is a bit of a misnomer. The eponymous hero doesn\u2019t actually \u201cbreak\u201d the internet (and certainly not in the way a Kardashian<\/a> might), and the long-awaited sequel to 2012\u2019s <\/span>Wreck-It Ralph<\/span><\/i> isn\u2019t necessarily about the internet, per se. What it <\/span>is<\/span><\/i> about is friendship \u2014 how we grow (up) together, and how sometimes that growing can unfortunately take us in separate directions. And while John C. Reilly\u2019s Ralph is the big name in the title, this sequel is more about Sarah Silverman\u2019s scrappy Vanellope von Schweetz, whose journey many viewers (especially the adults in the crowd) will find irresistibly relatable. <\/span><\/p>\n When <\/span>Ralph Breaks the Internet<\/span><\/i> begins, things are going pretty well for Ralph and Vanellope. The unlikely BFFs have settled into a comfortable routine: When the arcade opens in the morning, they live inside their respective games; when it closes at night, they grab dinner and a root beer and enjoy long, friendly chats until the sun comes up again. But things are growing tedious for Vanellope inside her home game, Sugar Rush. She knows every track by heart and is craving a new challenge. When Ralph tries to help her out by digging a new track, the game goes awry and the steering wheel breaks. It\u2019s an older arcade game, and the parts aren\u2019t easy to come by. Sugar Rush might be shut down. By coincidence, the arcade has just installed a strange new thing called \u201cWiFi,\u201d and so our heroes embark on a quest to find the replacement part so Vanellope and her Sugar Rush pals won\u2019t be homeless. <\/span><\/p>\n As you might expect, the world of the internet is vast and overwhelming, an animated sensory overload reminiscent of Las Vegas. While there, Ralph and Vanellope encounter many new characters, like KnowsMore (Alan Tudyk), an eager search engine anxious to predict users\u2019 needs, and JP Spamley (Bill Hader), a purveyor of archaic pop-up ads with offers that are too good to be true. After a hilarious misunderstanding at eBay, Ralph and Vanellope realize they need actual, real-world money to buy the part they need, and this is where their paths diverge. <\/span><\/p>\n While Ralph tries to earn some cash by remaking viral videos for the film\u2019s version of YouTube, Vanellope discovers what might be her true calling: a gritty multiplayer online racing game called Slaughter Race, which features an impossibly cool antagonist named Shank (Gal Gadot). Confronted by the prospect of losing Sugar Rush and the thing that has defined her entire existence, Vanellope finds a silver lining in Slaughter Race, which offers the challenges she\u2019s been craving. But this doesn\u2019t sit well with Ralph, who fears that he\u2019ll lose Vanellope \u2014 and their friendship \u2014 forever. <\/span><\/p>\n Ralph Breaks the Internet<\/span><\/i> does spend some time exploring how the internet can be both a good place and a terrible one, and how it has the potential to bring out the worst in people (as when Ralph makes the dire mistake of reading the comments on his videos), but the primary focus of this film is something deeper and more meaningful: friendship. Rather than introduce a predictable big bad, co-writers Pamela Ribon and Phil Johnston come up with something novel: The real villain of this movie isn\u2019t an internet troll or pop-up ads. It\u2019s insecurity \u2014 specifically Ralph\u2019s insecurities, which grow monstrous and take on a life of their own. And so it\u2019s not Slaughter Race and Shank that threaten to destroy his friendship with Vanellope, but Ralph himself. <\/span><\/p>\n These are concepts that both young and older viewers alike will find familiar, which isn\u2019t all that surprising for a Disney animated movie. Nor is it surprising when Ralph and Vanellope enter the Disney section of the internet, which is stacked with cameos from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (including a brief, very funny scene), <\/span>Star Wars<\/span><\/i>, and \u2014 as touted in the trailer \u2014 every Disney princess (most voiced by their original actors). That sequence in particular is quite charming, as it affectionately deconstructs the archetype while officially anointing Vanellope as a Disney princess. Later, Vanellope gets her very own princess song with music by Disney vet Alan Menken. <\/span><\/p>\n Ralph Breaks the Internet<\/span><\/i> is filled with thoughtful themes about friendship, overcoming insecurity, and growing up. But it\u2019s also just kind of \u2026 filled. Though incredibly sweet and ultimately poignant, the sequel is a bit overstuffed and somewhat long. Viewers will eventually be rewarded for their patience with a heartwarming ending \u2014 and an insanely hilarious post-credits scene.<\/span><\/p>\n Ralph Breaks the Internet is a bit of a misnomer. The eponymous hero doesn\u2019t actually \u201cbreak\u201d the internet (and certainly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":553,"featured_media":10622,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1381,340],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10621","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movies","category-movie-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/553"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Grade: B<\/span><\/h3>\n
1 hr., 54 min.; rated PG for some action and rude humor.<\/em><\/h5>\n
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